_johan Van Der Keuken_ “on Photography as the Art of Anxiety” (2001) _ American Suburb x

8/10/2019 _johan Van Der Keuken_ on Photography as the Art of Anxiety (2001) _ American Suburb x

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On Photography as the Art of Anxiety Introduction to The Lu cid Eye

By Alain Bergala

In the year 2000, a man collected the photos he had taken in the course of the last 46 years. This man is

internationally known today as one of the greatest documentary filmmakers of his time. It was howe!er an early

desire to take photographs which formed his destiny as an imagemaker. "e pu#lished his first al#um of photos

at the age of $%. It was almost #y default that he d ecided to enrol at the I&"'( )Institute des "autes 'tudes

(in*matographi+ues in -aris, in $/6, and he consoled himself for this decision to learn the art of cinema #y

saying that film is a kind of image too.

And yet this desire to #ecome a photographer, which he has ne!er gi!en up though he has ne!er ceased to gi!e it

second place to a certain etent, has ne!er gained the same recognition from the world at large as his desire to #e

a filmmaker.

There are dou#tless some fairly straightforward pu#licimage considerations #ehind this state of affairs. -u#lic

opinion, and the #odies which form it and legitimi1e it, do not like people to de!ote themsel!es to more than one

thing at a time if someone is considered to #e a filmmaker, the pu#lic will ne!er regard his photographic

acti!ities as anything more than a ho##y. This is why the photographs of 3im 3enders or A##as iarostami, of

which they ha!e also pu#lished se!eral collections, ha!e always #een percei!ed as 5filmmakers snapshots7. In

fact, there is some 8ustification for this point of !iew the su#8ects and landscapes found in their photographs

ha!e much the same aesthetic slant as that manifested in their films, so that the photos do seem to some etent to

ha!e #een 9deri!ed from their cinematographic work.

It is ne!ertheless clear thatVan der Keukens photographic workcould not in any way #e reduced to a

minor deri!ati!e of his filmmaking work in another medium. :f course, it was the same person who was making

the films and taking the photographs in parallel )or alternately, #ut that does not mean that it was necessarily

the same 5creator7 who had his eye #ehind the !iewfinder of the film camera and that of the photographic

camera. The creati!e path of ;an der euken the photographer has its own logic and timing, and is +uite

separate from that of ;an der euken the filmmaker. If he was a man who reali1ed +uite e arly on that it was

impossi#le to achie!e some kind of mental synchroni1ation of the cinematographic and photographic acts, he

was also a man who chose to ha!e two parallel artistic li!es, of which he found himself the astonished su#8ect at

each new change of direction.

I ha!e already mentioned the superficial reasons for this resistance to regarding the totality of &ou#tless the following while anyone who

knew his filmmaking work well would immediately recogni1e his hand, his style, in any closeup or film clip

shot and edited #y him, it is much more difficult to assign the ensem#le of his photographic work to a particular

style or 5authorship7.

Yvonne,$/6

Anyone going through the !arious sections of this #ook might legitimately ask himself how one can recogni1e a

;an der euken photo. 3hat is the common link that allows us to conclude that the sunny snapshots of holidays

in the ?outh, the Indian superimpositions, the +uasia#stractions of the twodimensional geometric images, the

shots of -aris in the /0s, the !iolence of the primary colours in his photos of @ew ork and the gentle tints of the

?panish fields of spring flowers in the year 2000 are all deri!ed from the !ision of the same man> It is practically

impossi#le if we think of the presence of the photographer in his pictures in terms of the classical idea of

5!ision7. :n the #asis of the e!idence, we must conclude that there is no ;an der euken !ision as there is a

&oisneau or a (artier Bresson !ision, i.e. !isi#le marks of a singular, permanent personal approach to the

perception of the real world. 3e are dealing with something +uite different here. ;an der eukens photos do

not reflect a classical !iew of the world, e!en though he was clearly tempted in this direction during his stay in

-aris at the end of the /0s, when his photographic approach seems to ha!e #een strongly marked #y that of the

great rench school of photography of that periodC nor did he swing permanently to a radically different

conception of the modern photographic act like that of Do#ert rank or 3illiam lein = though we know that

their photos of @ew ork had an enormous effect on him at the time. Inspection of his photos yields no e!idence

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It would howe!er #e an enormous error to think that ;an der euken is a photographer without any real

identity, swayed #y all the !arious photographic fashions which ha!e reigned o!er the past /0 years. 3e should

not conclude from the impermanence of his style that he is simply a stylistic opportunist. :n the contrary, as in

the work of -essoa )whose name does not arise here #y chance, the con!iction of the true fidelity to himself

resides not in a fro1en rigidity of style #ut in a multiplicity of forms and styles which is the only way to take

account of the impermanence of an anious perception of the world and of his place in it.

In each section of this #ook )corresponding to each new #urst of photographic creati!ity in ;an der eukens

life, it is his link with the world which demands the search for a new !ision, a new scale of perception, a new line

of +uestioning. or that is precisely what he uses photography for to chart what point he has reached in his

perception of the world = not 8ust his sensory perception, #ut at a much deeper, more secret le!el his

philosophical and metaphysical links with others and with the things around him. 3hile their photos ha!e

allowed many creati!e workers in this field to r ecord their !ision of the world, to lay down a !isual stylistic

signature, they ha!e ser!ed ;an der euken mainly as a tool of in!estigation what stage has he reached today,

this month or this year, in his ties with the world> And his consciousness of this link is ne!er superficial and

always multiple characteri1ing a perception which is at the same time emotional, political and metaphysical.

3hile photography is generally regarded as an art de!oted purely to the surface of things, it ne!er constituted for

him a tangi#le response to his anieties, a reassuring anchor sta#ili1ing his relationship to the world and offering

him the comfort of a permanence which is that of his 5personal !ision7 on the things of this world. In fact, the

!ery idea of a 5personal !ision7 implies that there is no pro#lem a#out the solidity and consistency of the dual

identity which forms the #asis for classical photography that of the world on the one hand and the o#ser!er on

the other. &escri#ing a photographic !ision as 5personal7 in!ol!es the assumption that a sta#le, o#8ecti!e world

eists and offers itself e +ually to all ordinary o#ser!ers, and that this +ualification designates not so much a

!ision of the world, with all the ine!ita#le distortion this may in!ol!e for me, as a discrete particular coloration of

the common way of looking at things, granted as a friendly gift to this or that photographer, an eye for easily

tamed peculiarities which soon #ecomes as familiar to us as the inflection of a well known !oice, or as a little

tune which we lo!e to hear again #ut which ne!er knocks us off our perch. The fact that this simile arose in my

mind while writing a#out ;an der euken is dou#tless due, unconsciously, to my memory of his !oice, so gentle,

so e!en and melodious, which immediately gi!es the person he is talking to the feeling of #eing in the protecti!e

1one of his intimacy and good will, a !oice recogni1a#le among thousands which ne!er re!eals anything of his

anguish, his re!olts, his irritation, as if it was the role of the pictures and film se+uences he made to take charge

of the anger and tensions, to trace the chiaroscuro of emotion or distress, the lines of rupture, and ne!er that of

the !oice which at all times was gi!en the task of maintaining the intimate, fraternal ties with his fellow man orspectator = e!en though in some of his films he pretends like Eodard to engage in a dialogue with his own inner

!oice. ?ince the photo is #y definition silent, doomed to the nondialectic dullness of its own surface, it has to

enclose, all on its own, silently, within its own poor rectangle all the tension which can #e manifested in the

cinema #y the interplay of mo!ing images and sounds.

Georgette,$/6

@othing in ;an der eukens photographic work e!er tries to a#sor# his permanent aniety, to free1e his

ceaseless meditation on the themes which preoccupy him, to offer any hope of one day attaining the serenity of

e!en a temporary sta#ility. The collection of these photos, taken #y the same man #etween the ages of $/ and 60,

finally separated from the stills from his films, pro!ides for the first time striking e!idence in #ook form of this

permanent ontological aniety, the spiral track of which is r eflected in his successi!e photographic pro8ects.

3hat is this dou#t, this aniety, a#out> A#out the fragility of any scale or scheme of perception. A#out the reality

of reality. A#out the !ery link #etween the photographer and the world, and more particularly #etween him and

the people whose picture he is taking. In short, a#out e!erything which normally forms the #asis for the

possi#ility of the act of capturing the world in a photographic image.

It must #e said that this triple +uestion is also at the heart of


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entertained within the unshakea#le rigour of a form which is firmly maintained = #ut without pride or

arrogance. "is craft ne!er re!eals an intoication with mastery he simply complies with the minimal, modest

re+uirements of his working morality of 5sustaining7 his images, as Eodard put it, which is the diametrical

opposite of the ostentatious marks of authority.

3hen &oes he resist this link with the world, with human

#eings, when he looks through the eyepiece of his camera> Is he not dealing here with a purely imaginary

scenario, a mental construction, which has nothing to do with the reality of solitude> 3itness is #orne to this !eryearly on in his work #y those photos where he feels the need to include himself in the picture, #ehind his su#8ect,

as if to assure himself of the reality of this shared presence, to escape a little from the ine!ita#le epulsion of

himself, #y himself, from the circle of the other at the moment when he takes the photo.

Yvonne, $/6

This feeling of distance, this awareness of the #eha!iour of the person who is taking the photographs, is already

e!ident in the photos he took as a !ery young man, which flatly contradict the collecti!e nature of the title he

chose for them 53e are $%7. This 5we7, which refers to the claim that the !ery young


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Being present in the world, in the white house, in other words #eing the photographer at the moment he takes a

picture of the white house, means #eing a#sent from your own self. This is one of the ma8or contradictions

re!ealed #y ;an der euken, in the slight detachment #etween him and the mo!ing picture of the world,

#etween the awareness of the act of photography and the innocent epanse of the world, a minute shift of which

his photos manifest, without pathos, the little metaphysical drama.

The filmmaker ;an der euken always regarded the choice of frames for his images as an ar#itrary act #y which

he felt that he was in some way wronging the world, that 5unsewn ro#e of reality7 which was so dear to Andr*

Ba1in. ;an der euken was often torn #etween his taste for sustaining images )without which the cameraman

might 8ust as well pack up his #ags and would ne!e r #e a#le to grasp any aspect of his art and the feeling that the

act of cutting off part of r eality and gi!ing it meaning against its own will em#odies a harmful arrogance. "e

sometimes used the term 5ecision7 to descri#e what was in his eyes the ontologically aggressi!e nature of the act

of framing = essential as it is to the filmmaker. The term speaks !olumes a#out the reticence of ;an der euken

the filmmaker = which is not simply a moral scruple #ut a#o!e all a regret for depri!ing the world of a

dimension of innocence which can only reside in the en8oyment of its own limitless epanse. raming the #ody of

reality remo!es an essential part of it, making it impossi#le for it to en8oy its own infinity, on which meaning

floats, undefined, alongside happiness. ;an der euken the filmmaker in!ented his 5unframed7 pictures, which

ha!e since #ecome famous. In this techni+ue, he thwarts the ar#itrary nature and the !anity of choosing one

frame for the picture rather than another, re!ealing the world as it presents itself innocently to the ga1e of the

o#ser!er from all directions at the same time. ;an der eukens deframing techni+ue is a relati!i1ation made

!isi#le of the act of framing, which re!eals the fragility of the ar#itrariness of this act and the humility of his

decision faced with the so!ereignty of the world, rather than a new act of framing which would simply reaffirm,

at the same le!el, the feeling of authority with which the filmmaker imposes his will on the !isi#le world.

The nature of photography would seem to make deframing almost impossi#le. The photographic act seems to

condemn the photographer to impale reality within a uni+ue frame, to proudly impose meaning on this fr agment

of the world #y this ar#itrary sectioning. It would seem to #e impossi#le for the photographer, e!en the one

which is most sensiti!e to the innocent continuity of the world, to diminish the arrogance of his act. 01u, a

filmmaker greatly admired #y ;an der euken, relati!i1ed the power of the formal affirmation of the frame #y

stacking the points of !iew to create a picture made up of cu#e after cu#e, where none of the points of !iew

seems to #e su#8ect to the authority of the filmmaker. The world may well #e enclosed in frame upon frame, #ut

not one of these frames suggests the arrogance of a central figure organi1ing the !iew on the #asis of his

5personal7 !iew of things. The impersonali1ation of the frames and the stacking of the planes, redefining space as

a pile of cu#es, in the work of :1u transforms this reconstruction of the world into an enormous respect for it.

The strategies ;an der euken followed as a photographer often aim at the ideal of a similar upsetting of

esta#lished !iews.

"ow can you frame photos without doing !iolence to the world> ;an der euken has tried ceaselessly as a

photographer to a!oid the uni+ue, inelucta#le pseudofatality of the act of framing. "e has tried to use all

imagina#le )and technically feasi#le strategies to erase any hint of o!eraffirmation )5I see thatJ7 from the

finished picture. To replace the instant of decision in the act of p hotography #y a state of indecision.

:ne way ;an der euken did this was #y replacing the single, decisi!e frame of a photo #y a 5trial and error7

frame, in a series of attacks on the same theme, none of which pretends to #e the a#solutely right one. If the

5right7 image does not eist in the face of the multiplicity of all the possi#le approaches to this little #it of the

world, you ha!e to choose not to choose #etween all those !arious images, none of which can do full 8ustice to

this corner of the rue de ?eillans in -aris, which caught the photographers eye and inspired him to make this,

one of the first cu#ist gestures in the early d ays of cu#ism. This multiple series of treatments of the same theme

dedramati1es the act of choice in!ol!ed in any framing operation. 'ach frame chosen #ecomes one of the

possi#ilities without claiming to #e the last word, the single, proud, right frame, the instant of decision. It will #e

recogni1ed one day that the +uestions Eodard and ;an der euken asked, the ideas they researched, o!er a

period of more than 40 years often ran parallel, e!en though the former managed to #uild up the pu#lic image of

an artist who was a #it of a seer, a #it of a thunderer, as opposed to the more and more secret nature of his films,

while the latter has always re8ected such showmanship, displaying a generous modesty +uite in character with

his work. Eodard, in his film work, also had a time when he shared this desire to #reak totally with the classical

tradition which teaches that for e!ery shot there is one single good angle and one single good d istance. This

occurred in the middle of


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the fact that I see them as ri!als #ecause each one is in its own place.7

In his last photo of his sister


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_johan Van Der Keuken_ “on Photography as the Art of Anxiety” (2001) _ American Suburb x

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